The Stanley Cup

exploring the past hockey leagues of north america

The Stanley Cup's origin is being
awarded to the best amateur club in the Dominion of
Canada. Now under the governence of the National Hockey
League it is awarded yearly to the winner of the NHL
playoffs. The following information was condensed
and edited from Wikipedia.

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Stanley Cup-Beginning

The Stanley Cup, originally a decorative bowl purchased
from a London silversmith,
was donated in 1892 by Lord Stanley, the Governor
General of Canada.
It was the trophy given to the top
amateur hockey team in Canada. Lord Stanley made several
preliminary regulations regarding the Stanley Cup:

The Cup also acted
as the league championship of the league that the champion
belonged in.
The Cup was not the property of any given team at any given
time. The Cup
trustees have the final say on disputes should there be any on who the Cup
holder should be.
Challengers for the Cup must have won their league championship.
The challenge games (where the Cup could change leagues) were to be decided
either in one game affair, a two-game total goals affair, or a best of three
series, to the benefit of both teams involved. All matches would take place
on the home ice of the champions, although specific dates and times would have
to be approved by the trustees.
Ticket receipts from the challenge games were to be split equally between
both teams.
A league may not challenge for the Cup twice in one season.
The Cup champions have the responsibility to return the Cup in good condition
when required by the trustees.
The Cup champions could add a silver ring to the Cup to commemorate their
Cup victory.

The Cup was originally presented in 1893 to the Montreal
AAA, the champion of the Amateur
Hockey Association, the
top hockey league of Canada at the time. Unlike today's playoff
series the champion of the Cup was open for "challenges".
This was where any team could challenge the Cup holder to
a series in an attempt to win the Cup. This sometimes made
for more than one Cup holder in any one year and also led
to some lopsided scores in championship games.

Stanley Cup Competing Leagues

When someone mentions the Stanley Cup, we immediately associate
it with the National Hockey League (NHL). Since the Cup was
first put up in 1893 the following leagues have
competed
for possession
of
it.
This
listing
includes
both the amateur and professional league that have challenged
for the cup.

Stanley Cup-The Amateur
Years

The first Stanley Cup playoff game occurred on March
17, 1894, and the first game where the Cup was
on the line occurred on March 22, 1894..
That year saw four teams out of the five-team AHA tied
for the championship with records
of 5-3-0. This created problems for the AHA governors and
the league trustees as to which team was champion, as there
were no tie breaking system in place. After long negotiation
and the withdrawal of Quebec from the championship situation,
it was decided that a three-team tournament would take place
in Montreal, with the Ottawa team getting a bye to the finals
(being the sole "road" team). The first Stanley
Cup Final game saw the Montreal AAA successfully defending
their title with a 3-1 win.

The next year saw the first challenge for the cup, by Queen's
University.
On March 8, 1895 the Montreal Victorias won the Amateur Hockey
Association title, and thus the Stanley Cup. The challenge
match, which had been scheduled for the next day,
was to be between the previous year's champion (Montreal
AAA) and the university squad.
It was decided by the Stanley Cup trustees that the Montreal
AAA would represent the Amateur Hockey Association in the
challenge match. If Montreal won the Cup would be presented
to the Montreal Victorias as the league champion. Queens
University would have retained the Cup if they would have
won. Monttreal defeated Queens 5-1 and the Montreal Victorias
wre awarded the Stanley Cup. (oh for the good old days of
winning the Cup without having to play a series in June)

The first successful challenge was made the next year by
the Winnipeg Victorias, champions of the Manitoba
Hockey League. On February 14, 1896, the Winnipeg squad defeated
the champions 2-0, becoming the first team from outside of
the AHA to win the Cup. Their cup reign was brief, though:
the Montreal Victorias, upon winning the AHA championship,
demanded a rematch for the Cup. In what was said to be the
most anticipated hockey game of the time, the Montreal Victorias
defeated the Winnipeg Victorias 6-5 on December 30, 1896.

The first best-of-three challenge was originally scheduled
in 1897 between the AHA champion Montreal Victorias against
the Central Canada Hockey Association champion Ottawa Capitals.
However, the series was ended after the first game, after
the Victorias clearly had the upper hand in a 14-2 victory.
It would be until 1899 that the first true best-of-three
challenge series was played (although the Winnipeg Victorias
forfeited the second game - and the championship - after
a controversial referee call), and 1900 that the first best-of-three
challenge went the distance.

1899 also saw the Cup being defended by two different teams
in the same year, as the Montreal Victorias and new league
champions Montreal Shamrocks defended the Cup against the
Winnipeg Victorias and Queen's University, respectively.

The challenge series of January 1902 saw the first series
where the Canadian Amateur Hockey League (formerly the AHA)
was not involved.

The 1903 challenge series was the first to have a game replayed.
On January 31, the clock struck midnight as the second game
of the series remained tied 2-2 following 27 minutes of overtime
between the Winnipeg Victorias and Montreal AAA. Because
of the Sabbath, the game was replayed on February 2, with
Winnipeg winning 4-2 to even the series. A month later, the
AAA would finish third in the CAHL standings with the top
two teams tied in the standings, and thus the Stanley Cup
champions was determined from a two-game totals affair between
the Montreal Victorias and the Ottawa Silver Seven. The Silver
Seven, upon winning the title, were then forced to defend
their championship two days later in a challenge series against
the Rat Portage Thistles, a series that the Ottawa easily
won.

On January 30, 1904, a league game between the Silver Seven
and the Montreal Victorias started late and both teams agreed
to end the game at midnight, with the Silver Seven leading
4-1. The CAHL ordered instead the game to be replayed instead
of aborted, and the ensuing debate caused the Silver Seven
withdrawing from the CAHL. The CAHL hoped that, now without
Ottawa, the Cup would remain with the CAHL and become the
property of its Quebec team, while the Cup trustees thought
otherwise. For a while, the Silver Seven were not affiliated
with any league, but in 1905, they would join the rival Federal
Amateur Hockey League. That year saw the Dawson City Nuggets
in one of the more legendary Stanley Cup challenge series
- partly because of the 4000-mile journey from the Yukon
to the Nation's Capital, and partly because how the Nuggets,
tired from the long trip and arriving in Ottawa only a day
before the game, were outplayed in the series. The second
game of this series set many Stanley Cup records that were
unmatched to this date, when Frank McGee scored 14 goals
in a 23-2 rout, the largest margin of victory for any challenge
game or Stanley Cup Final game to date.

Stanley Cup-The Amateur Winners

1906-07

Kenora Thistles (March 18)

Tommy Phillips

1906-07

Kenora Thistles (January)

Tommy Phillips

1905-06

Montreal Wanderers (March)

Cecil Blachford

1905-06

Ottawa Silver Seven (Febuary)

A.T. Smith

1904-05

Ottawa Silver Seven

A.T. Smith

1903-04

Ottawa Silver Seven

A. T. Smith

1902-03

Ottawa Silver Seven (March)

A. T. Smith

1902-03

Montreal AAA (Febuary)

C. McKerrow

1901-02

Montreal A.A.A. (March)

C. McKerrow

1901-02

Winnipeg Victorias (January)

1900-01

Winnipeg Victorias

D.H. Bain

1899-00

Montreal Shamrocks

H.J. Trihey

1898-99

Montreal Shamrocks (March)

H.J. Trihey

1898-99

Montreal Victorias (Febuary)

Mike Grant

1897-98

Montreal Victorias

F. Richardson

1896-97

Montreal Victorias

Mike Grant

1895-96

Montreal Victorias (December)

Mike Grant

1895-96

Winnipeg Victorias (Febuary)

J.C. G. Armytage

1894-95

Montreal Victorias

Mike Grant

1893-94

Montreal AAA

.

1892-93

Montreal AAA

Stanley Cup-Professional
Years

Many of the "amateur leagues" were quietly paying
top players
under the table.The rising tide of professional teams led
to the Stanley Cup being opened to professional teams in
1906. The Montreal Wanderers were
the first officially-sanctioned professional team to win the
Cup. The Allan Cup championship
was launched in 1908 as Canada’s
new amateur team trophy.

1906 saw the creation of the Eastern
Canada Amateur Hockey Association and, in December of that year, the first professional players
to play
for (and win) the Stanley Cup. Until 1910, when Cup trustees declared
that only players who played in their league's regular season were eligible
to play for the Cup, it was commonplace for both champion and challenger
in the challenge series to bring in professional ringers to play the
challenge games. 1908 saw the first all-professional team, the Toronto
Trolley Leaguers, compete for the Stanley Cup. By then, the Allan Cup
replaced the Stanley Cup as the trophy for Canada's amateurs, and the
Stanley Cup became a symbol of professional hockey supremacy.

The 1909 saw the departure of the Montreal AAA and the Montreal Victorias,
the two remaining amateur teams, from the ECAHA, and thus the ECAHA dropped
the "Amateur" from their name, becoming an all-pro league.
The following year saw the Canadian
Hockey Association (formerly the
ECHA) kicking out the Montreal Wanderers as well as the Ottawa Senators
(formerly the Silver Seven) leaving the CHA in mid-season after a challenge
series for the newly-formed National Hockey Association. With two strong
teams in the NHA, the NHA soon proved to be unquestionably the top league
in Canada.

Prior to 1912, challenges could take place at any time, given the appropriate
rink conditions, and it was common for teams to defend the Cup numerous
times in the year. In 1912, Cup trustees declared that the Cup was only
to be defended at the end of the champion team's regular season.

In 1914, the Victoria Aristocrats from the Pacific
Coast Hockey Association informally "challenged" the Cup champion Toronto Blueshirts
to a series of exhibition series. This would set up an agreement between
the NHA and the PCHA a year later where their respective champions would
face each other for the Cup, an agreement that, by large, lasted until
1926. The Stanley Cup Final series would alternate between the east and
the west each year, while the differing rule sets of the NHA and PCHA
would alternate each game. The Vancouver Millionaires would win the first "formal" final,
three games to zero in a best-of-five series.

1916 saw the first American team, the Portland Rosebuds, in either league,
as well as the first American team in the Stanley Cup Final. The following
year saw the first American team (the Seattle Metropolitans) to host
(and win) the Cup. 1918 saw the dissolution of the NHA and the formation
of the National Hockey League in its place. The Stanley Cup finals format
remained largely unchanged until 1922, with the creation of the Western
Canada Hockey League, where two of the league champions would face each
other for the right to face the third champion. In 1924, because of a
dispute on whether to send one or both of the western champions east,
the PCHL's Vancouver Maroons and the WCHA's Calgary Tigers played in
a series on the way east to determine who would get the free pass to
the Finals and who would face the Montreal Maroons in the semifinal bout.

1925 saw the merger of the PCHA and the WCHL to form the Western Hockey
League, and its demise a year later meant that the NHL got exclusive
control of the Stanley Cup.

The Cup has been awarded every year since 1893, except for 1919 for
a flu epidemic and 2005 due a labor disruption.
The Montreal Canadiens
have won the most Stanley
Cups, 24. The Toronto Maple Leafs come in second with 13 Cup wins. The
highest-ranking American team is the Detroit Red Wings with 10 wins.

There are actually two Stanley Cups; the original, which is presented
to the winning team, and a duplicate which is displayed in the Hockey
Hall of Fame and is also used for promotions. It currently stands at
880 mm (35 1/4 inches) tall and weighs almost 14.6 kilograms (32 lb).
To have one's name inscribed on the Stanley Cup, a player must have played
at least 41 games for the team during the regular season (provided the
player remains with the team when they win the Cup) or a game of the
Finals, although the NHL will also permit other reasons on a case-by-case
basis.

A unique feature of the Stanley Cup is the fact that, with few exceptions
in the past, the Stanley Cup is the only trophy in professional sports
that has the name of every member of the winning team engraved upon it.
This has not always been the case - one of Lord Stanley's original conditions
said that each team could, at their own expense, add a ring on the Cup
to commemorate their Cup victory (the first year being an exception).
Initially, there was only one ring, the one added by the Montreal AAA.
Teams would engrave their names on that one ring until it was full in
1902, and with no room to engrave their names (perhaps unwilling to pay
for a second band to the Cup), teams left their mark on the bowl itself,
starting with the 1903 Montreal AAA and continuing to 1908. In particular,
the 1907 Montreal Wanderers recorded their names inside the bowl's interior.

In 1908, for reasons unknown, the Wanderers, despite having turned aside
four challengers, did not record their names on the Cup. The next year
saw the Ottawa Senators add a new band onto the Cup. Despite the new
room on the Cup, the 1910 Wanderers and the 1911 Senators, for reasons
unknown, did not put their names on the Cup. The new band would eventually
be filled by the Vancouver Millionaires, who, although they did not properly
win the Cup (which by then was a formal championship game akin to the
World Series), they did win the league championship of the previous champion's
league. It has also been noted that two other teams were on the Cup due
to the "league championship" clause from 1915 to 1918, although
they did not officially win the Cup.

It was a mystery why no further engraving occurred until 1924, when
the Canadiens added a new band on the Cup. However, since then, the engraving
of the team and its players have been an annual tradition that has not
been broken. In particular, a new band was added each year until the
Cup was redesigned in 1948, causing the Cup to balloon in size from 16
inches (400 mm) tall in 1909 to almost three feet (900 mm) in height
in 1940. The Cup was redesigned in 1948 as a two-piece cigar-shaped trophy
with a removable bowl and collar. This Cup also properly honored those
teams that did not engrave their names on the Cup themselves.

The modern one-piece Cup design was introduced in 1958 with the replacement
of the old barrel with a five-band barrel (each of which could contain
13 winning teams). Although the bands were originally designed to fill
up during the Cup's centennial year, the names of the 1965 Montreal Canadiens
were engraved over a larger area than allotted (and thus there are 12
teams on that band instead of 13). The bands were finally filled up in
1991 when a decision was made to preserve the top band of the large barrel
in the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, Ontario and introduce a new blank
band at the bottom so that the size of the Stanley Cup would not grow
further. In 2004, a second band replacement was needed. It is also to
be noted that since 1958, the Cup underwent several minor alterations,
namely the retirement of the collar in 1963 and the bowl in 1969 in favor
of duplicate ones due to the originals being too brittle.

Stanley Cup-The Professional Winners

Stanley
Cup Winners after formation of NHL in 1917

Year

Winning
Team/Coach

Losing
Team/Coach

Result

2004

Tampa Bay/John Tortorella

Calgary/Darryl Sutter

4-3

2003

New
Jersey/Pat Burns

Anaheim/Mike
Babcock

4-3

2002

Detroit/Scotty
Bowman

Carolina/Paul
Maurice

4-1

2001

Colorado/Bob
Hartley

New
Jersey/Larry Robinson

4-3

2000

New
Jersey/Robinson

Dallas/Ken
Hitchcock

4-2

1999

Dallas/Ken
Hitchcock

Buffalo/
Lindy Ruff

4-2

1998

Detroit/Scotty
Bowman

Washington/Ron
Wilson

4-0

1997

Detroit/Scotty
Bowman

Philadelphia/Terry
Murray

4-0

1996

Colorado/Marc
Crawford

Florida/Doug
MacLean

4-0

1995

New
Jersey/Jacques Lemaire

Detroit/Scotty
Bowman

4-0

1994

NY
Rangers/Mike Keenan

Vancouver/Pat
Quinn

4-3

1993

Montreal/Jacques
Demers

Los Angeles/Barry
Melrose

4-1

1992

Pittsburgh/Scotty
Bowman

Chicago/Mike
Keenan

4-0

1991

Pittsburgh/Bob
Johnson

Minnesota/Bob
Gainey

4-2

1990

Edmonton/John
Muckler

Boston/Mike
Milbury

4-1

1989

Calgary/Terry
Crisp

Montreal/Pat
Burns

4-2

1988

Edmonton/Glen
Sather

Boston/Terry
O'Reilly

4-0

1987

Edmonton/Glen
Sather

Philadelphia/Mike
Keenan

4-3

1986

Montreal/Jean
Perron

Calgary/Bob
Johnson

4-1

1985

Edmonton/Glen
Sather

Philadelphia/Mike
Keenan

4-1

1984

Edmonton/Glen
Sather

NY
Islanders/Al Arbour

4-1

1983

NY
Islanders/Al Arbour

Edmonton/Glen
Sather

4-0

1982

NY
Islanders/Al Arbour

Vancouver/Roger
Neilson

4-0

1981

NY
Islanders/Al Arbour

Minnesota/Glen
Somner

4-1

1980

NY
Islanders/Al Arbour

Philadelphia/Pat
Quinn

4-2

1979

Montreal/Scotty
Bowman

NY
Rangers/Fred Shero

4-1

1978

Montreal/Scotty
Bowman

Boston/Don
Cherry

4-2

1977

Montreal/Scotty
Bowman

Boston/Don
Cherry

4-0

1976

Montreal/Scotty
Bowman

Philadelphia/Fred
Shero

4-0

1975

Philadelphia/Fred
Shero

Buffalo/Floyd
Smith

4-2

1974

Philadelphia/Fred
Shero

Boston/Bep
Guidolin

4-2

1973

Montreal/Scotty
Bowman

Chicago/Billy
Reay

4-2

1972

Boston/Tom
Johnson

NY
Rangers/Emile Francis

4-2

1971

Montreal/Al
MacNeil

Chicago/Billy
Reay

4-2

1970

Boston/Harry
Sinden

St. Louis/Scotty
Bowman

4-0

1969

Montreal/Claude
Ruel

St. Louis/Scotty
Bowman

4-0

1968

Montreal/Toe
Blake

St. Louis/Scotty
Bowman

4-0

1967

Toronto/Punch
Imlach

Montreal/Toe
Blake

4-2

1966

Montreal/Toe
Blake

Detroit/Sid
Abel

4-2

1965

Montreal/Toe
Blake

Chicago/Billy
Reay

4-3

1964

Toronto/Punch
Imlach

Detroit/Sid
Abel

4-3

1963

Toronto/Punch
Imlach

Detroit/Sid
Abel

4-1

1962

Toronto/Punch
Imlach

Chicago/Rudy
Pilous

4-2

1961

Chicago/Rudy
Pilous

Detroit/Sid
Abel

4-2

1960

Montreal/Toe
Blake

Toronto/Punch
Imlach

4-0

1959

Montreal/Toe
Blake

Toronto/Punch
Imlach

4-1

1958

Montreal/Toe
Blake

Boston/Milt
Schmidt

4-2

1957

Montreal/Toe
Blake

Boston/Milt
Schmidt

4-1

1956

Montreal/Toe
Blake

Detroit/Jimmy
Skinner

4-1

1955

Detroit/Jimmy
Skinner

Montreal/Dick
Irvin

4-3

1954

Detroit/Tommy
Ivan

Montreal/Dick
Irvin

4-3

1953

Montreal/Dick
Irvin

Boston/Lynn
Patrick

4-1

1952

Detroit/Tommy
Ivan

Montreal/Dick
Irvin

4-0

1951

Toronto/Joe
Primeau

Montreal/Dick
Irvin

4-1

1950

Detroit/Tommy
Ivan

NY
Rangers/Lynn Patrick

4-3

1949

Toronto/Hap
Day

Detroit/Tommy
Ivan

4-0

1948

Toronto/Hap
Day

Detroit/Tommy
Ivan

4-0

1947

Toronto/Hap
Day

Montreal/Dick
Irvin

4-2

1946

Montreal/Dick
Irvin

Boston/Dit
Clapper

4-1

1945

Toronto/Hap
Day

Detroit/Jack
Adams

4-3

1944

Montreal/Dick
Irvin

Chicago/Paul
Thompson

4-0

1943

Detroit/Jack
Adams

Boston/Art
Ross

4-0

1942

Toronto/Hap
Day

Detroit/Jack
Adams

4-3

1941

Boston/Cooney
Weiland

Detroit/Ebbie
Goodfellow

4-0

1940

NY
Rangers/Frank Boucher

Toronto/Dick
Irvin

4-2

1939

Boston/Art
Ross

Toronto/Dick
Irvin

4-1

1938

Chicago/Bill
Stewart

Toronto/Dick
Irvin

3-1

1937

Detroit/Jack
Adams

NY
Rangers/Lester Patrick

3-2

1936

Detroit/Jack
Adams

Toronto/Dick
Irvin

3-1

1935

Montreal*/Tom
Gorman

Toronto/Dick
Irvin

3-0

1934

Chicago/Tom
Gorman

Detroit/Herbie
Lewis

3-1

1933

NY
Rangers/Lester Patrick

Toronto/Dick
Irvin

3-1

1932

Toronto/Dick
Irvin

NY
Rangers/Lester Patrick

3-0

1931

Montreal/Cecil
Hart

Chicago/Dick
Irvin

3-1

1930

Montreal/Cecil
Hart

Boston/Art
Ross

2-0

1929

Boston/Cy
Denneny

NY
Rangers/Lester Patrick

2-0

1928

NY
Rangers/Lester Patrick

Montreal*/Eddie
Gerard

3-2

1927

Ottawa/Dave
Gill

Boston/Art
Ross

2-0-2

1926

Montreal*/Eddie
Gerard

Victoria/Lester
Patrick

3-1

1925

Victoria/Lester
Patrick

Montreal/Leo
Dandurand

3-1

1924

Montreal/Leo
Dandurand

Calgary
Tigers/Eddie Oatman

2-0

Vancouver
Maroons/Lloyd Cook, Frank Patrick

2-0

1923

Ottawa/Pete
Green

Edmonton
Eskimos/Ken McKenzie

2-0

Vancouver
Maroons/Frank Patrick, Lloyd Cook

3-1

1922

Toronto/George
O'Donahue

Vancouver
Millionaires**/Frank Patrick, Lloyd Cook

3-2

1921

Ottawa/Pete
Green

Vancouver
Millionaires **/Frank Patrick, Lloyd Cook

3-2

1920

Ottawa/Pete
Green

Seattle/Pete
Muldoon

3-2

1918

Toronto/Dick
Carroll

Vancouver
Millionaires**/Frank Patrick

3-2

1916-17

Seattle Metropolitans

Pete Muldoon

1915-16

Montreal Canadiens

George Kennedy

1914-15

Vancouver Millionaires

Frank Patrick

1913-14

Toronto Blueshirts

Scotty Davidson*

1912-13

Quebec Bulldogs

Joe Malone*

1911-12

Quebec Bulldogs

C. Nolan

1910-11

Ottawa Senators

Bruce Stuart*

1909-10

Montreal Wanderers

Pud Glass*

1908-09

Ottawa Senators

Bruce Stuart*

1907-08

Montreal Wanderers

Cecil Blachford

1906-07

Montreal Wanderers (March25)

Cecil Blachford

*Montreal
Maroons (NHL folded in 1938)

**Vancouver
Millionaires (folded along with PCHA in 1925)

Note: There
was no Stanley Cup champion in 1919. The series between Montreal and Seattle was cancelled due to an influenza epidemic.